History of Santa Clara County California with biographical sketches, Part 129

Author: Sawyer, Eugene T
Publication date: 1922
Publisher: Los Angeles : Historic Record Co.
Number of Pages: 1934

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While the family were living in Cattaraugus Coun- ty, N. Y., Uriah Wood was born September 5, 1829. He was ten years old when he accompanied his par- ents to Illinois. At the time the family resided in Illinois, schools were so uncommon that there was little opportunity of studying under teachers, yet he acquired valuable information not to be found in text- books. He was the possessor of a robust constitu- tion, unusual capabilities, and his services were eager- ly sought by farmers. At the age of seventeen he re- ceived $15 per month, this being the highest wages paid any man in all that country. Half of his wages he gave his father, and the balance was used for the necessities of life. With four yoke of oxen and a breaking plow he turned the furrows in many acres of primitive land, his work being always carefully and well done. Somttimes he drove to Chicago with his father, hauling wheat to market. During the fall of 1850 he worked for a man in Arkansas and while with him made two trips to New Orleans on large flat boats, returning on a steamer. There were three young men in the party that started for the West in

1852. Their ox teams were shipped to St. Joseph, Mo., where they were taken from the cars and hitched to wagons. The difficult journey was made over plains and mountains, across rivers and through deserts, down the Humboldt River and on to Hang- town, where they arrived in September, 1852. The journey was less arduous for them than for many emigrants, for the Indians did not molest them, nor were they short of provisions. Mr. Wood spent a short time in Calaveras County in the mines; then went to Spanish Flats and in the fall of 1853 tried his luck on the middle fork of the American River. He did not meet with the success that he had antici- pated, and decided to change his occupation, so went to Coloma, thence to Sacramento, where he received $50 a month for driving a team. In the spring of 1854 he came to Santa Clara County, and bought two yoke of oxen and a wagon, and engaged in teaming in the redwoods. Money being scarce he accepted as pay- ment horses and cattle. In this way he accumulated one hundred head of cattle, which he sold, and with the proceeds bought 842 head of sheep. For eighteen months he herded his flock in the Pacheco Moun- tains and then moved them into Merced County, es- tablishing a sheep ranch at Los Banos, ten miles from his nearest neighbor. After investigating land in various parts of the state and finding nothing better suited to his purpose than the land he occupied, he bought the property. Each year his flock was al- most doubled. At first he was obliged to pump all the water needed by the flock, but after some years the canal was built through his land. During the dry year of 1863 he managed to keep his flock almost in- tact, but in 1864 he suffered heavy losses, losing over three thousand sheep.

Adding to his original purchase year by year, Mr. Wood finally acquired 5000 acres. Much of this was rented to tenants. When he first began to sell, he received thirty dollars an acre, but afterwards was paid as much as $125 an acre. In 1898 he owned 3500 acres of farm land in Merced County, operated by two tenants, and principally under grain and hay. In addition he owned the San Felipe ranch of 240 acres near Gilroy. In 1905 all of his real estate was incor- porated under the title of the Uriah Wood Company. In 1885 he erected a beautiful residence in San Jose. Various enterprises engaged his attention, among them being the Farmers Union, the Garden City Bank and the Bank of San Jose. He was one of the founders of the Bank of Hollister and of the San Benito County Savings Bank. He was also a stock- holder in the Salinas City Bank of Salinas, Cal. Was also a member of the Santa Clara County Pioneer Association; fraternally was an Odd Fellow, and in politics gave his influence and vote to Republican candidates. During 1862 he returned to Illinois and in Earlville married Miss Phoebe L. Smith, who was born in Ohio and grew to womanhood in Illinois. She passed away in 1905, while he died in June 1914. They were the parents of four sons, Chester W., Walter H., Ralph W., and Louis E., all of whom are successful landowners and agriculturists. Mr. Wood belonged to that class of pioneers to whom California owes a debt of gratitude, who gave the best that was in them to aid in the development of the state and the expansion of her interests.

Wich Hood

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WILLIAM E. SWEATT .- On the pages of Cal- ifornia pioneer history appears the name of William E. Sweatt, a native son, born in the city of San Francisco, August 7, 1869. His parents, Leroy and Abbie J. (Hanson) Sweatt, were natives of Con- cord, N. H., who migrated to California by way of the Isthmus of Panama in the year 1867, settling in San Francisco. The father was for a number of years employed by the Pioneer Planing Mill No 1 as an expert shaper man. A few years later he removed his family to Santa Clara County. when William E. was seven years old, where he farmed for a number of years near San Jose; then for three years he engaged in farming in the Santa Cruz Mountains near Saratoga.

W. E. Sweatt received his education in the gram- mar schools of San Jose, where his father was en- gaged in the house moving business, and which has also engaged the attention of the sou for thirty-five years, as he and his father started together. He does a general house-moving business, confining his business now to the Santa Clara Valley. He em- ploys two men the year round, although some years ngo he ran five crews. Mr. Sweatt has never mar- ried. He resides with his mother at 74 North Fif- teenth Street, who is hale and hearty at the age of seventy-eight; his father died in the year 1910. His political allegiance has ever been given to the Re- publican party and he is also an active member of the Builders' Exchange. He takes a good citizen's part on all matters calculated to foster and aid in the advancement of his community.

SIMEON BAKER .- A veteran of the Civil War and who, at four-score and three, appears as hale and chipper as if he were only sixty, is Simeon Baker, a charter member of Dix Post No. 42, G. A. R., at San Jose, and the junior vice-commander of that Post. He was born in Sturgis, St. Joseph County, Mich., on August 28, 1838, the son of James Baker, who came from Hornell, Steuben County, N. Y., to Michigan in 1837, and took up a Govern- ment claim of a quarter of section of land. He was a member of a family that went back to at least the American Revolution. He married Miss Ana Mac- lntyre, a lady of Scotch descent, who was born in the United States shortly after her parents migrated hither from the land of Burns. James Baker, who died altogether prematurely of pneumonia, was a seventh son, as was his son, Simeon Baker.

Simeon grew up in a pioneer's home two miles from the schoolhouse, and had to walk each day to and fro from school; so it is not surprising that he had the advantages of schooling only in the winter time, and had to prolong his ordinary studies until he was nineteen years old. He largely educated himself, and then, having received a certificate in Indiana, he spent a season teaching school. After the death of James Baker, his widow remarried, be- coming the wife of Andrew Kilberry, and moved with her family to La Grange County, Ind., where she lived to be eighty-two years old; and it was in that vicinity that Simeon taught school.

When twenty years of age, our subject came across the great plains, liaving joined an immigrant train of people from his home neighborhood made up at Morris. Il1, starting with a yoke of oxen, a prairie schooner and a yoke of cows, and continued with them as far as the Missouri River. There the party decided to break up, some to go to Pike's Peak,

then the cause of a gold excitement, to prospect; while others, including Mr. Baker, preferred to push on the California. So he sold his outfit to his brother, O. L. Baker, and joined Jacob McKizzick, who was driving a herd of 700 cattle across the plains from the Middle West, and he was hired by Mr. McKiz- zick as a cattle driver and caretaker. However, the balance of the original party soon changed their minds, and decided to come on to California; and, at the summit of the Rockies, the portion of the party with which he had been numbered, overtook Mr. McKizzick's outfit, and Mr. Baker came ou to the Golden State with his own people, landing in Honey Lake Valley, Cal., on his twenty-first birth- day, 1859, having traveled by way of Forts Kearney and Laramie.

After reaching here, Mr. Baker tried his luck at placer mining in Shasta County for a while, and then, in 1860, he went to Virginia City, Nev., and prospected there, without much success. He then went to Plumas County, Cal., and farmed a large acreage; and with his own team, he brought in the first quartz mill there, for John Ellis and John Bid- well, transporting it from Chico to Indian Valley. He stayed there until the fall of 1862, and then he came to San Jose, near which city he took up farm- ing, and he continued to follow agricultural pursuits until he went into the army.

He served in Company G of the Eighth Infantry, attached to the heavy artillery, from November 24, 1864. There were two companies at Mare Island, four at Fort Point, and two at Black Point; he was stationed at Port Point, and received his appoint- ment of orderly sergeant there. He had charge of the men mustered into Companies C and D and it was his duty to equip Company C with 101 men, and Company D with 100 men. He clothed, fed, drilled and fitted out the men fully for service, or saw that it was done, and he holds the record of making only one mistake, involving thirty-eight cents, the price of one pair of socks, in doing this extensive and responsible work. He served until November, 1865, when he received his honorable dis- charge, after which he made a visit to his home in Hornell, N. Y., and to La Grange County, Ind.

In 1866, Mr. Baker returned to San Jose, and then went to Hollister, then in Monterey County. In the winter of 1868, took up grain farming, and sold out in the fall of 1872. He next went to Bakers- field, where he took up 480 acres of Government land, but he sold out in 1876. From Bakersfield he went to Owens Valley, on Bishop Creek, near Bishop, and there he stayed one winter. Then he went to Mono County, and at Lundy he mined; he was one of the organizers of the Tioga district, and was its first recorder, and held that position until the Lundy district took in that of Tioga. This was after the mines were struck at Lundy, and the set- tlement went to Lundy, at which town he remained for two years, when he sold out his mining interests.

He then returned to San Jose in 1880 and bought a place of 160 acres near Saratoga; he had range land and cleaned up some of it, and selling out in 1885 he moved to San Jose, where he engaged in the livery business and ran a stage to Mt. Hamilton, sending a bus up there daily. At the end of six and a half years he sold out, and his health demand- ing a change of climate and work, he went to Mari- posa County and prospected. The summers of the

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following ten years he spent in the Yosemite Valley, while each fall he bought up a herd of turkeys in Mariposa and Merced counties, and drove them North, usually from Merced, to the vicinity of Stockton and Tracy, finally disposing of them at Thanksgiving time. In 1908, he returned to San Jose, and here he has since been retired.

On September 9, 1874, Mr. Baker was married at Bakersfield to Miss Mattie Lundy, a native of Cass County, Mich., and the daughter of James and Elizabeth Lundy, farmer folks who came to Kern County in early days. Five children blessed this union. Effie is Mrs. John Brown of Fruitvale, Ala- meda County; A. Elmo Baker lives at Gilroy; Wil- liam J. Baker is in a lumber camp in Plumas County: J. Wiley Baker is in the shipyards at Oakland, and Alva R. Baker is in Burlingame. Mrs. Brown has two children, a daughter and a son, and the latter served his country in the late war, and was at the naval aviation field, near San Francisco. Three sons of Mr. and Mrs. Baker, Elmo, William and Wiley, also saw service in the late war, and William got as far as France, where he was a sergeant, and was in charge of German prisoners. Wiley was detailed to Camp Mills, N. Y. Mr. Baker is now a member of Sheridan-Dix Post.

ARTHUR J. SNYDER .- A native son of Califor- nia, who was born, reared and educated in Santa Clara County is Arthur J. Snyder, the only living son of the late John Snyder, an early pioneer and a suc- cessful rancher. Arthur J. was born on the ranch of his parents near Mountain View, December 11, 1858: he attended the country schools and in 1880 took a business course in San Jose, and then assisted his father in the management of his various tracts of land. John Snyder, the father, was born in 1828 in Indiana, the son of Joseph K. Snyder, a native of Pennsylvania, who had married Miss Sarah Fleming, born in France. The Snyders settled in Indiana in 1821, but in 1839 removed to Iowa, where their family of five daughters and three sons were reared and edu- cated. In 1849 John Snyder joined a party crossing the plains and first settled where the city of Chico now stands, and in the fall of 1855 he was married to Martha Kifer. He became an extensive landowner and his efforts along agricultural and horticultural lines greatly increased the quantity of the products of the locality. He passed away during August, 1901, a man of noble, useful and upright characteris- tics. Mr. Snyder passed away in January, 1919, aged eighty-three. The maternal grandfather was Shelby H. Kifer, born in Kentucky in 1842. His father, John Kifer, was a native of Pennsylvania and his mother of Kentucky. In 1845 the family removed to Missouri and lived there for eight years. In 1853 they came to California, making the trip overland, and finally settled in Santa Clara County, where they purchased a ranch of seventy-five acres, all under cul- tivation. In 1870 John Kifer married Isabella Smith, a native of Nova Scotia.

The marriage of Arthur J. Snyder occurred in San Francisco, September 14, 1887, and united him with Miss Lenora A. Davidson, a daughter of Alonzo Davidson. born in Nova Scotia, a pioneer of San Francisco, engaged in the dairy business, but now dead. The mother, Mrs. Lizzie (Ruffley) Davidson, born in England, is still living at the old home place on Eureka Street, San Francisco. Of their six chil-

dren four are living, Mrs. Snyder being the second oldest. Mr. and Mrs. Snyder are the parents of three children; Alonzo J., who is engaged in business in San Jose; Elizabeth E. is the wife of Major D. W. Forbes, D. D. S., of the U. S. Army, and they have two children-William and Donna; Arthur D. died when but eight years old. Arthur J. Snyder sold his ranch below Mountain View to take charge of his mother's place on Permanente Creek until her death, when with his sisters, Mrs. Foss and Mrs. Kendall, he was appointed executor of the estate and in 1920 disposed of 700 acres in the Fremont town- ship to Archbishop Hanna on which will be erected a Catholic seminary. Alonzo J. served in the late war in Company H, Three Hundred Sixty-third in- fantry, and was in the following battles, Ypres, Lys, St. Mihiel, Mense and Argonne, being at the latter place nine days, five of which he was without food. He was one of the boys to go over the top on that memorable day, September 15, 1918. Arthur J. Snyder owns an eighty-acre ranch one mile north of Moun- tain View on the Sterling Road. (Since this biog- raphy was written, Mr. Snyder passed away, March 29, 1922, mourned by his family and many friends.)

HENRY A. RENGSTORFF .- Following in his father's footsteps, Henry A. Rengstorff is well and favorably known throughout Santa Clara County and stands for the best interests politically, socially and religiously. He owns and operates a 195-acre ranch located on the Charleston Road near Moun- tain View and devotes most of his time to the cul- tivation and improvement of this ranch. Born No- vember 27, 1867, on the home ranch of his parents, he was educated in the public schools of the Whis- man district, and later attended the California Mili- tary Academy at Oakland. His father, Henry Reng- storff, married Miss Christine F. Hessler, both na- tives of Germany, the father coming to California as a single man in 1850. He came to Santa Clara County from San Francisco in 1851 and worked on farms, saved his money and in a few years acquired large tracts of land. There were seven children in the family, of whom Henry, the subject of this sketch, is the sixth. The father passed away in 1906 and the mother in 1919. After finishing school, Henry was called upon to assist his father in the management of his different farms and assumed re- sponsibility and management of the warehouses at Rengstorff's Landing, and for sixteen years was steadily on the job, doing a large volume of busi- ness in buying, selling and shipping hay and grain. In 1915 he built his fine, modern bungalow on the home place, which consists of 195 acres three and one-half miles northwest of Mountain View on the Charleston Road.

Mr. Rengstorff's marriage united him with Miss Nellie S. Baker of San Jose, formerly a teacher in the public schools at Mountain View. She comes from a distinguished pioneer family. Her mother, now eighty-six years of age, crossed the plains with her parents in 1847, when eleven years old. They were bound for California, but meeting a person who told them of the fate of the Donner party, they despaired of getting through to California, so changed their course and went to Oregon instead. Mrs. Baker is living with Mr. and Mrs. Rengstorff, and is one of the oldest of the people, now living, who crossed the plains to the Pacific Coast. Mr. Rengstorff is a stockholder and director in the

Ag. Anyda

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HISTORY OF SANTA CLARA COUNTY

Farmers and Merchants Bank of Mountain View. Mr. and Mrs. Rengstorff are both actively interested in the Christian Science Church of Mountain View, she being the first reader and he the second. They have been adherents of this faith since 1911 and are both prominent in the affairs of that movement. They move in the best circles, and have many friends. Mr. Rengstorff gives his support to the Republican party. He is a thirty-second degree Mason, and is past master of the Blue Lodge at Mountain View. Mr. and Mrs. Rengstorff are mem- hers of Mira Monte Chapter O. E. S. at Mountain View, and Mr. Rengstorff is also a member of Islam Temple, A. A. O. N. M. S., of San Francisco.

LAURENCE G. RANDALL .- Popularly and widely known, Laurence G. Randall, the manufac- turer of fine candies, frozen puddings and ice creams at Mountain View, enjoys the patronage not only of his own town and immediate vicinity, but also of other parts of Santa Clara County, where connois- seurs are willing to journey some distance in order to get the very best. This enviable reputation, the result of honest dealing and clever, progressive en- terprise, has enabled Mr. Randall to build up a wholesale trade of large volume.

A native son, Mr. Randall was born in San Fran- cisco on May 9, 1892, the son of William J. Randall, who had been born on the boundary line of Califor- nia and Nevada. Grandfather William E. Randall was a '49er, of Scotch origin, and came out to the gold coast from the East. William J. Randall was a well-known newspaper man, and had the largest "Call" route in the Bay City, running from Larkin Street and the City Hall to the Beach. He married Miss Abbie L. Perham, and both died in 1909, within nine months of each other. They had three children, and two have grown up to maturity. William Edgar Randall is the noted cartoonist on the New York Dramatic Mirror; he was injured in an automobile accident in San Diego, and since then he has drawn his cartoons left-handed.

Laurence Randall was in the upper grade of the grammar school in San Francisco when his parents died, but he managed to enjoy the benefits of three and one-half years in the high school after that, when he started out into the world and entered the confectionery trade, at which he served a regular apprenticeship at Selby O'Brien's, and with other leading confectioners. He learned the business thor- oughly and for five years worked at Venice, Cal. Then, in 1919, he came to Mountain View and bought out Lovejoy's Candy Store; and with his long experience at Venice, and two years in San Diego, in the service of Barbour Brothers, he had no difficulty from the first to get the interested atten- tion and satisfaction of the Mountain View public, the people of this locality being especially loyal in supporting home industries. "Randall's" has be- come famous for its luncheon menus, its ice creams, its fancy specials, and its varied thirst-quenching suggestions. The store has one of the best-main- tained soda fountains in California, and a most at- tractive ice cream parlor.

Mr. Randall's mother was of English origin, by way of an early New England family, some of whom served with the Green Mountain boys in the Revo- lutionary War; and she was born in New Hamp- shire and educated in Vermont. They were Unitar- ians, noted for their altruistic, intellectual interest in

society, and our subject has inherited their com- mendable traits, with the natural result that he makes and holds friends. He is a member of the Native Sons of the Golden West, and is president of the Mountain View Parlor, one of the liveliest parlors in the state, having recently initiated thirty-two mem- bers at one meeting. He also belongs to the Elks. He was married at San Diego to Miss Helen Mc- Dougall, a daughter of John McDougall, the pro- prietor of the Del Monte Restaurant at Mountain View; and they have two children, Laurence, aged six, and Jack, who is three years old.

GEORGE P. BURKETT .- One of the represen- tative citizens of San Jose who has the distinction of being the president of the largest truck and storage business in the county of Santa Clara is George P. Burkett, who began at the bottom and worked up trom an employee to be the owner and manager of nis own business. He was also counted among the prominent ranchers of his neighborhood for some time, during the ten years that he was engaged in raising stock near San Felipe. He was born in North Carolina, at Jefferson, Ashe County, in April, 1856, and was the son of Daniel and Nancy (John- ston) Burkett. His father was a planter of North Carolina, who lived his entire life of one hundred years and eight months in that state, dying in 1919.

George had only the opportunity of attending the common school of Jefferson, N. C. In 1879, he left his native state and went to Pueblo, Colo., and here worked for the Pueblo Transfer Company a short time and then he engaged in farming there, raising grain and some stock. In 1883, he came to Cali- fornia and settling in Santa Cruz, worked first for the Daniels Transfer Company, which at that time was located where the St. George Hotel now stands. On January 1, 1889, he came to San Jose and en- gaged in the transfer business for a number of years in partnership with his brother-in-law, S. F. Mikel, who later sold out his interest, and in 1891 Mr. Burkett organized the San Jose Transfer Company, Inc., of which he was made president. In the early years of the company, horses were used and at one time the company owned a hundred head of horses and had their own corral and also were the owners of their warehouses. Now instead of using horses, they have about twelve trucks, ranging from one to five-ton capacity. The San Jose Transfer Company handles a great deal of transfer business through the different forwarding companies of the Bay Cities, shipping goods to all parts of the United States. In connection with his transfer business Mr. Burkett ran a stock farm near San Felipe for about ten ycars, where he had an average of 100 head of cat- tle and leased over 800 acres of land. His transfer business had grown to such an extent that so much of his time had to be given to it that in 1914 he discontinued ranching and confined his entire at- tention to his other enterprise.

Mr. Burkett's marriage, which occurred at Jeffer- son, N. C., in the year of 1878, united him with Miss Isabel Mikel, who was born in Jefferson, N. C., and was the daughter of M. L. and Nancy (King) Mikel. Mrs. Burkett's father was connected with a cotton mill in the South. Mr. and Mrs. Burkett are the parents of three children: Edgar is married and is now residing in San Jose; Katheryn lives at home, and Fannie became the wife of Cyril Odelin and they also make their home at San Jose. Mr. Burkett

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is a popular member of Garden City Lodge I. O. O. F. of San Jose, and has passed all the chairs, and is a member of the Encampment; he is also a Mason, a charter member of Fraternity Lodge No. 399, F. & A. M., and of the Scottish Rite bodies. In national politics, he is a Democrat, but is always ready to sanction good men and good measures regardless of party lines.

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History of Santa Clara County California with biographical sketches, Part 129

Author: Sawyer, Eugene T Publication date: 1922 Publisher: Los Angeles : Historic Record Co. Number of Pages: 1934

Author: Sawyer, Eugene T
Publication date: 1922
Publisher: Los Angeles : Historic Record Co.
Number of Pages: 1934